1844 - 1913

Ethel Ralston, like her husband, Hollister Daniels, came from Oregon pioneers. One of her grandmothers was born in Oregon in 1848, her parents having made the overland trip in 1847.

But her Ralston grandparents, while we’d consider them pioneers, came later to Oregon, arriving in the mid 1870s, almost twenty years after Oregon statehood.

Samuel and Elizabeth Ralston married in Madison County, Iowa in 1869. (Madison County was the setting of the novel and movie “Bridges of Madison County.) There were two children born in Winterset, Iowa, then the family came to Oregon where three more children were born.

Ethel had some information about her grandmother, Elizabeth Ralston. And in my research, I have found more.

Elizabeth Rebecca Caldwell was born August 1, 1844 in Vinago County, Ohio*. Her father was an itinerant preacher, traveling from place to place. Her mother died when Elizabeth was five years old. Elizabeth’s father soon remarried, but it turned out that the new stepmother didn’t like Elizabeth or her two older siblings. So, Elizabeth’s father took her to Dowagiac, Michigan and left her with a family named Conine.

Ethel refers to this time as Elizabeth being a “bound girl.” In a letter written by Samuel Ralston to a granddaughter or niece**, he said:

“She lived with them until she was grown. When Mother was a small girl, they considered it necessary to keep them busy, because ‘Satan finds something for idle hands to do,’ so when there was no work they had her carry chips across the road, and if there was still no work to do, she carried the chips back across the road. When she finished school, she went to Iowa and got a teaching certificate, and taught for quite some time.”

Ethel notes that she sold Watkins Products, traveling by horse and buggy. She was 25 when she married, so she would have had to support herself for a fair amount of time, if she finished school at 15 or 16.

After she married Samuel Ralston, though, she devoted herself to raising her family and working in her church. Her itinerant preacher father was a Methodist, but Samuel Ralston was Presbyterian, so that became her new church. Her son, though, said “I remember her singing the Old Methodist Hymns, while doing the work about the house.”

Elizabeth and Samuel Ralston lived for years in the Halsey, Oregon area, but finally settled in Brownsville, Oregon. Elizabeth died on May 19, 1913 at the Oregon State Hospital (the mental institution) in Salem, Oregon. She had suffered from dementia and eventually died of “La Grippe,” or influenza.

The Brownsville Times, in their obituary, said “All her life she lived a consistent Christian. Her greatest interest apart from her family was in her church . . . Because of her goodness and interest in others, she made many friends, and it was with deep sorrow that these saw her gradual decline in health, and breakdown of her physical energies.”

Elizabeth and her husband Samuel Ralston are buried in Kirk Cemetery near Brownsville.

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*Census records don't show a Vinago County, Ohio, but there is a spelling similar in Pennsylvania.

**The letter excerpt is courtesy of a distant cousin back east. He received it from Mary Lou Cooley, who would be descended from Winifred Ralston. The confusion comes because he assumes the letter was written by Elizabeth's husband Samuel. I'm thinking it was written by Elizabeth's son Samuel.